TENNIS

TENNIS; Mauresmo and Agassi Wilt In the French Open Spotlight

By CHRISTOPHER CLAREY

Published: June 4, 2003

PARIS, June 3—
Who wouldn't get nervous stepping onto a tennis court with millions of people watching your every move?

It's all in how you handle it. Though it was certainly predictable that Serena Williams would handle it much better than Amélie Mauresmo at the French Open today, it was quite a bit more surprising that Guillermo Coria would manage the moment better than Andre Agassi in Coria's first Grand Slam quarterfinal.

In their two previous matches on hardcourts, Coria won a total of four games, but today Agassi was the one struggling to keep up, and in the end he did not control nearly enough rallies to avoid a 4-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 defeat.

Coria's father might have named him for the former Argentine star Guillermo Vilas, but Agassi was the one on Coria's television screen when he was growing up. And even if at age 33 Agassi no longer bears much resemblance to the long-haired, denim-shorted teen idol who first commanded a gifted youngster's attention, he is still the player the 21-year-old Coria intends to measure himself by.

''Listen,'' Agassi said, ''I'd rather not be his idol and play him on hard court than be his idol and play him on clay.''

Agassi won this title in 1999, but he has now lost three consecutive times in the quarterfinals, and on all three occasions he has been beaten by exceptionally quick young players who look a lot more comfortable sliding than Agassi does: first Sébastien Grosjean, then Juan Carlos Ferrero and now the fluid Coria, who is riding an 11-match winning streak after taking the Masters Series title on clay in Hamburg last month.

The journey by the seventh-seeded Coria to this brightly lighted place has not been without controversy. In 2001, he tested positive for the banned steroid nandrolone, and though he convinced the ATP that he had ingested it unwittingly through a contaminated nutritional supplement, he was still suspended for seven months and stripped of ranking points and nearly $100,000 in prize money, leaving him in financial difficulty.

''What happened to me is behind me, and I think that now I'm living through the happiest moment of my life,'' he said. ''I never thought that I wasn't going to come back. Nor did I think I wasn't going to be able to regain my game.''

He will next face the unseeded, uninhibited Martin Verkerk, who beat the clay-court master Carlos Moya, 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 4-6, 8-6. Verkerk, a late-blooming, serve-booming Dutchman, arrived in Paris for his first French Open with a losing record for the season and is now in the semifinals after crunching 27 aces against the fourth-seeded Moya.

Williams advanced easily, and her 6-1, 6-2 victory was mundane in tennis terms. But as a psychological study, it was morbidly fascinating. Mauresmo has played up to her potential on the other center courts that matter most in the game: in Melbourne, Australia; in the London suburbs; and in the borough of Queens. But she has rarely managed to show the right stuff on the court that matters most in her own country.

In the semifinals, Williams will face fourth-seeded Justine Henin-Hardenne of Belgium, who defeated eighth-seeded Chanda Rubin of the United States, 6-3, 6-2.

The other semifinal will match Henin-Hardenne's compatriot Kim Clijsters against the surprise of the tournament: 76th-ranked Nadia Petrova of Russia. Clijsters was simply too complete and powerful for the Spanish veteran Conchita Martínez in her quarterfinal, winning, 6-2, 6-1. Petrova, a lean 20-year-old with a poker face and attacking instincts, had to run quite a bit more to break down the formidable defenses of Vera Zvonareva, a Russian 18-year-old, 6-1, 4-6, 6-3.

The French had been looking forward to Mauresmo's quarterfinal with Williams since the draw was made 12 days ago, and as Mauresmo began rolling through her early rounds, expectation evolved into hype. But from the first game, it was clear that Mauresmo's doubts and demons had returned.

With Williams serving, Mauresmo failed to get a return in the court and hit three shots off the frame of her racket. When it was her turn to serve, she double-faulted twice and hit two weak, short second serves that Williams crushed for return winners.

The crowd at the Philippe Chatrier Court was already clapping for her as urgently as if she were facing match point, but despite all the support, or perhaps because of it, Mauresmo's right arm and legs remained tight. After 11 minutes, she trailed by 0-4. After 22 minutes, she lost the first set.

After the match, while Mauresmo packed her rackets, Williams boldly walked back onto the court and waved and pirouetted to the crowd. They greeted her with a mixture of boos and cheers, but in truth, she had nothing to apologize for and much to teach Mauresmo about handling the great, invisible weight of expectation.

''I've had to learn to put myself in a bubble,'' Williams said. ''Not to hear anything else, just hear the sound of the ball.''